Toddler left in mom's car taken to Phoenix tow yard

A toddler was towed in her mother's car to a Phoenix tow yard earlier this month after the woman told police all her valuables were out of the car, police said.

The 2-year-old's mother was driving two other women and several children when Phoenix Police officers pulled her over for a rear light violation near Southern and Seventh avenues about 7 p.m. on Saint Patrick's Day, according to press release from Phoenix Police Department.

When police discovered she was driving on a suspended license, they chose to tow her 2003 Chevy Impala. Police said this enraged the mother, who began yelling at the officers and refusing to cooperate. Soon, neighborhood residents emerged from their houses and joined her in berating the officers, police said.

One of her adult passengers tried to deescalate the situation while the other began removing children from the car, police said. Meanwhile, the police told the woman a tow truck driver was going to tow her car, and she reacted by remotely locking the doors and refusing to hand over the keys.

Police told her to make sure she had taken her valuables out of the car, to which she replied that there were none before walking away with the keys.

Police could not see the toddler through the Impala's tinted windows and released the car to the towing company.

Thirty minutes later, dispatch received a call from the mother, who had realized her child was missing and probably still inside the car- by then at a tow lot near Lower Buckeye Road and 39th Avenue. The officers involved contacted the towing company, which found the child uninjured, asleep in the backseat.

Police said there was no reason for them to force entry into the car because they saw children being removed during the incident, and the woman knew how many children were in the car and maintained there were no valuables left inside.

"This is a valuable lesson for all involved," said Detective James Holmes, a spokesman for Phoenix Police Department, in the press release. "We have an incredible responsibility to our children and we have to account for their whereabouts at all times."